Solo miner nets 3.1569 BTC block reward on CKPool

A solo miner using the CKPool service solved Bitcoin block 960804 on Aug. 2, 2026, at 02:11 UTC and received the full block reward of 3.1569 BTC, roughly $200,000 at the time. The payout went to a bitcoin address tied to CKPool and represents the 317th solo block the service has facilitated, according to the pool developer.

The reward combined the fixed 3.125 BTC subsidy with about 0.032 BTC in transaction fees drawn from 4,243 transactions included in the block. Blockchain data show the reward attribution to Solo CKPool.

CKPool developer Con Kolivas posted on X that the miner’s computing power was “wildly variable, presumably rental, peaking at 100 PH.” At that peak, the hashrate represented about 0.011% of the network, which was near 924 exahashes per second. Kolivas noted that at a sustained 100 petahashes per second a miner could expect to find a block roughly once every 64 days if the hashrate held steady.

CKPool allows operators to point mining equipment at shared infrastructure without running their own Bitcoin node. When a solo user finds a block, the miner receives the entire reward and CKPool takes a small fee, commonly cited at about 2%.

Kolivas highlighted a software milestone around the find. He wrote that the block was “the first mainnet block solved since the incorporation of the Stratum V2 code into the ckpool codebase,” while the block itself was found using the older Stratum V1 protocol. He added: “Despite the chaos from the hardware wallet exploit, bitcoin just keeps on doing its tick-tock next block.” Kolivas also described the timing as “virtually deterministic at almost exactly 100% diff,” referring to the pool’s difficulty setting when the block was found.

Solo block discoveries remain uncommon in an industry concentrated around large industrial pools, but they still occur when a miner has sufficient hashrate and a valid block template. The growth of rented hashrate markets has made occasional solo wins more attainable than hobbyist setups alone, though outcomes vary day to day.

Bitcoin’s next difficulty adjustment is projected for around Aug. 8, 2026. The BIP-110 soft fork mandate is also expected near that time. Network hashrate has pulled back from late-2025 peaks, a shift observers link in part to mining economics and increased competition for electricity and hardware from artificial intelligence data centers.

The identity of the miner behind block 960804 remains unknown, and there is no public information on whether they will continue renting hashrate, expand operations, or move the funds.